Budget, Federal Budget | featured news

Wednesday morning, President Barack Obama became the first Democratic president ever to propose cutting Social Security. Democrats spend so much time defending the president, it is easy to forget that even the most beloved presidents make mistakes and missteps. His new budget, which proposes a new method of calculating inflation increases in Social Security payments, is a doozy.

South Carolina Senator Lindsey Graham on Sunday became the first prominent Republican to publicly praise, however lukewarmly, the budget proposal the White House outlined last week. Graham said that while he believes President Barack Obama's plan is overall bad for the economy, "there are nuggets of his budget that I think are optimistic," and that could set the stage for a broad bargain to put the nation's finances on a stronger footing. He was speaking on NBC's "Meet the Press" program.

Republicans are ready to ram through the House an election-year, $3.5 trillion budget that showcases their deficit-cutting plan for revamping Medicare and slicing everything from food stamps to transportation while rejecting President Barack Obama's call to raise taxes on the rich....

It sounds like a pretty good starting point for negotiations: The White House and Capitol Hill Democrats say they're ready to meet the GOP halfway in the latest round of budget talks, offering $50 billion in cuts compared with Republicans' proposed $100 billion worth of reductions....

President Obama wants more control over the country's budget, and plans to ask Congress for it this week.

The federal deficit through the first four months of the budget year is running at a record-breaking pace even though the deficit in January was slightly smaller than expected.

Signaling a fading chance for compromise, a leading Republican negotiator on health care legislation on Saturday criticized Democratic legislative proposals as budget-busters that would reroute Medicare spending and restrict medical choices.

President Obama will propose $17 billion in spending cuts today, less than half of 1% of his budget, including cuts in weapons ...

Plan approved in 233-193 vote endorses much of Obama's agenda; no Republicans backed measure.

President Barack Obama said on Saturday he would soon announce the elimination of dozens of wasteful or ineffective government programs as part of a broad effort to restore fiscal accountability to the federal budget.